Business Practices in Libraryland: Process Management

Figuring out the best way to get something done can feel like operating a Rube Goldberg Machine... Not in a good way.

So, last time, we talked about Project Management, and how the three legged approach of time, money, and scope affect your operations and projects and can make or break how efficiently you work. Now, we're going to get into the weeds and examine that efficiency. How well do you own your processes?

Process management is a touchy area, and can be heavily influenced by:

Too Many Chiefs... Not Enough Indians.

How many "bosses" are in a given process? Do the workers feel empowered to make suggestions to boost productivity? Or are they overworked, and tired of hearing different things from different people?

We've Always Done It Like This...

Change Freaks Me Out...

We've Been Here Before.

And the list goes on...

The fact remains, the majority of your workday is made up of how effectively, or ineffectively, you complete the processes that drive your decision and activities.

Appian.com defines Process Management as the "aligning processes with an organization’s strategic goals, designing and implementing process architectures, establishing process measurement systems that align with organizational goals, and educating and organizing managers so that they will manage processes effectively."

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In short, your life gets a lot easier if you

figure out the best way to work.

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Taking a look at the flow for each of the major processes in your library is a great place to begin. No one is going to expect your workers to achieve Six-Sigma efficiency.

For the unfamiliar, Six-Sigma is a "performance improvement approach that aims at leaner business operations and a quality level at less than 3.4 defects per a million opportunities." (https://www.6sigma.us/) They achieve this goal by following a five step process of examination: Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control and Repeat. The people who specialize in this are called Blackbelts. How cool is that?

I speak from experience when I say, this principle of 3.4 defects/million is VERY hard to quantify in a non-manufacturing situation. However, the five key principles can be applied to measure how effectively your team is working, or how a process is working for you.

Just because you don't achieve strict Six-Sig level efficiency, you can:

DEFINE

Figure out what's most important for any given task. This is where you need to get all your Chiefs (ahem... Key Stake Holders) and current process holders around a table and have them suss out what is the MOST IMPORTANT part. Then you focus all your energy on getting that done in as few steps as possible.

MEASURE

ANALYZE

IMPROVE

CONTROL

REPEAT

So, that story for the "We've Always Done it Like..." people? This one comes from our the annals of Six-Sigma herself:

A twenty-something finally gets his own place, and decides to cook Christmas dinner for the first time, all by himself. He asks his mom how to cook the Christmas Ham, and she says to cut off the top and the bottom, put it in the pan, and bake it at 350 for 2 hours. The son pushes back and says, "Why do you cut off the top and bottom?" and she says, "Because that's what my mom always did... there must have been a good reason."

At Christmas, the son and the mom sit down with grandma, and the son asks, "Hey Grams... why do we cut the top and bottom off the Christmas ham?" And Grandma looks at her grandson and says, " I always did it like that because it wouldn't fit in my pan otherwise."

Don't be like that. Believing that you have to do something because someone told you it's always been done like that is a perfect example of Cultural Conditioning. Expect better for your library and your staff. Don't waste good ham because Grandma's pan was too small. You have a bigger pan and want all the ham. Go get it!

Next up: Creative Content!

Links:

https://www.rubegoldberg.org/

https://www.6sigma.us/

https://sixsigmadsi.com/grandmas-ham-a-story-of-cultural-training/